Female Fashion Photographers - Where are They?

"If you look at the most successful photographers in the world, the top ten are all male, except for maybe [husband-wife team] Inez and Vinoodh. Photography has been a male-dominated business since it began."
Amanda de Cadenet



In 2017, 153 magazine covers from ten of the leading US-American fashion magazines were mainly shot by men, with only 13.7% being shot by women. Some magazines, like e.g. Marie Claire, did not hire a female photographer for the cover shot the whole year. The advertising industry is even more extreme. According to data from major photography publications and awards organisations, male photographers made up between 89 and 96% of those in the advertising categories between 2013 and 2017 (via).

"Over 50 percent of grads coming out of photo school are female, and yet when you look around at the assistants out there, the vast majority are male. Assisting is a physically demanding job, where strength and height are very helpful. I've spoken to countless women who tried to enter the field, but could not get assisting work. Two told me that some agencies outright stated they don't use female assistants. As assisting is the most common path to becoming a photographer, if you shut this door, that can be the end for some."
Cybele Malinowski

"We need to have a say in how we're represented. What I see with women photographing other women is that we find the nuance. We often find different things interesting and beautiful and sexy and charismatic than when men photograph women. I think a lot of it, unfortunately, comes down to sexualizing."
Amanda de Cadenet




photographs of Marilyn Monroe with Milton Hawthorne Greene's (1922-1985) son Joshua via and via and via and via, (c) Joshua Greene, Archive Images